Key Master Lawsuits Generate Internet Buzz

TAGS: amusement business, Key Master, Sega, coin machine

The bicoastal legal action -- brought by the law firm of Wolf, Haldenstein, Adler, Freeman & Herz LLP -- alleges that Sega's Key Master is "rigged" to award prizes only when a predetermined amount of money is deposited, even if the player successfully manipulated the game's controls to win.

The class-action lawsuits filed in Los Angeles and Westchester County, NY, allege damages on behalf of two individual plaintiffs, C. Stuart Brown of New York and Yael Kempe of California. The legal strategy would seem to be an eventual lawsuit on behalf of a class of similar plaintiffs and a large payday for the law firm.

Although the potentially highly profitable lawsuit for the plaintiffs' legal team could take years to resolve, the Internet is abuzz with this story. Copies of the game's service manual began circulating online while someone claiming to be a technician at an FEC in California, using screen handle TheDJTec, provided unflattering technical details of the Key Master and other skill games on the Reddit website. Influential videogame blogs Kotaku and Sega Nerds have also picked up on the story.